Botswana hopes to leverage its 0% import-tariff rate to the US to start exporting more jewelry there, Bogolo Joy Kenewendo, minister of minerals and energy, said during New York Climate Week.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re starting to see those that actually make jewelry in Botswana also export here to the US, and we are looking to create a much more concerted line to market in the US to take advantage of that tariff,\u201d Kenewendo said in an exclusive interview with Rapaport News last week.<\/p>\n
The country was \u201cexcited\u201d and \u201cglad\u201d to achieve the exemption, she observed.<\/p>\n
Botswana\u2019s diamond industry has boosted the country\u2019s development far beyond the economic aspect, she continued. Diamond revenue contributed to enabling legislation allowing every child to finish high school, she explained, and university students don\u2019t need to take out loans.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is just the social development aspect; the economic development, the cornerstone of our economy has been diamonds,\u201d Kenewendo elaborated. \u201cGranted, now we are seeing the importance of diversifying and moving away from a mono-sectoral economy, but diamonds remain such a strong pillar of who we are and where we\u2019re going \u2013 what we wish to bequeath to the next generation.\u201d<\/p>\n
Focus on diversification<\/p>\n
The slump in the diamond trade has been \u201cpainful\u201d for Botswana, given its reliance on the industry, but it has also allowed it to think creatively about diversification, Kenewendo observed.<\/p>\n
She pointed to the country\u2019s Botswana Economic Transformation Programme (BETP), which focuses on six pillars such as manufacturing, agriculture and mining to help it to diversify. Both the president and the vice president lead the initiative.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, Kenewendo predicted Botswana\u2019s diamond industry would now focus on provenance, origin and impact.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s why we\u2019re here telling the story beyond the schools, the roads, the hospitals and venturing into one of the things were most proud of, which is conservation,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Partnering on progress<\/p>\n